(RSF/IFEX) – One year after his kidnapping in Ingushetia on 4 July 2003, there is still no news of journalist Ali Astamirov, an Agence France-Presse (AFP) correspondent in Ingushetia and neighbouring Chechnya. RSF has called on the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances to launch an official enquiry into the case and […]
(RSF/IFEX) – One year after his kidnapping in Ingushetia on 4 July 2003, there is still no news of journalist Ali Astamirov, an Agence France-Presse (AFP) correspondent in Ingushetia and neighbouring Chechnya.
RSF has called on the United Nations Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances to launch an official enquiry into the case and ensure that every possible effort is made by Russian and Ingushetian authorities to establish the truth about what happened to the journalist.
The organisation has also asked Council of Europe Secretary-General Walter Schwimmer and the Council’s Parliamentary Assembly President Peter Shieder to set up an ad hoc commission to deal with the case and use their influence with Russian and Ingushetian authorities to persuade them to redouble their efforts in the investigation.
“We do not know if Astamirov is still alive, who his kidnappers are and why they have taken him,” said RSF Secretary-General Robert Ménard. “The total lack of news is disturbing. We cannot allow his case to be forgotten in a region where working as a journalist is extremely dangerous and where news is sparse.”
Investigators on the case in Moscow and the Ingushetian capital of Nazran have so far come up empty-handed in their enquiries. No ransom demand has been received by his family or AFP and the kidnappers have not tried to contact them.
Astamirov was taken away by armed men in the village of Altievo, three kilometres from Nazran, in the presence of other journalists. The 34-year-old Chechen, who is the father of two children, had been with AFP for one year. He was previously employed by a privately-owned radio station in the Chechen capital of Grozny and worked as a correspondent for the local branch of the Russian TV station NTV between 1998 and October 1999, when fighting broke out in the region.
In the months before he was seized, Astamirov had received anonymous threats and had been forced to move for fear of his safety. This and the absence of any ransom demand suggest he was kidnapped because of his journalistic work.
In October 2003, RSF sponsored an appeal for his release, signed by 10 journalists and former hostages in Lebanon, the Philippines and Colombia. “One of the few journalists reporting on this terrible war and its litany of abuses has been silenced,” they noted. The 10 journalists and the dates they were kidnapped are:
Roger Auque – Lebanon (1987)
Maryse Burgot – Jolo, Philippines (2000)
Scott Dalton – Colombia (2003)
Jean-Jacques Le Garrec – Jolo, Philippines (2000)
Jean-Paul Kauffmann – Lebanon (1985-88)
Andreas Lorenz – Jolo, Philippines (2000)
Roland Madura – Jolo, Philippines (2000)
Ruth Morris – Colombia (2003)
Jean-Louis Normandin – Lebanon (1986-87)
Philippe Rochot – Lebanon (1986)
